HistoryExtra
type: channel
link: https://www.historyextra.com
description: Home of Britain’s bestselling history magazine and award-winning podcast
date: 2026-04-01T10:53:19.000Z
update period: hourly
update frequency: 1
update base: 2000-01-01T12:00+00:00
items: Creating fake Paris: why did one man build a hoax French capital?
items: Spy, hero, rebel, traitor: the story of Roger Casement
items: How the work of American folk song collectors inspired The History of Sound
items: The First World War’s deadliest battle was stalling, but everything changed when Little Willie arrived
items: How tanks redefined warfare
items: The First World War’s Christmas truce is a heartwarming story – but it never happened
items: Did the WW1 Christmas truce really happen?
items: Why were these British Second World War burials draped with Nazi flags?
items: How a forgotten law helped women’s football conquer the world – but only by accident
items: Not just the Western Front: why we can't ignore the rest of the world

Creating fake Paris: why did one man build a hoax French capital?
type: item
date: 2026-04-01T10:35:41.000Z
creator: Gavin Mortimer
subject: First World War
subject: Membership
subject: Period
description: As German aircraft attacked Paris during WWI, one man had an idea: what if you could fool the enemy into dropping their bombs elsewhere? Gavin Mortimer tells the story of an audacious wartime ruse...
encoded: Tucked away in a British newspaper called The Globe in its edition of 4 October 1920 was a short story with an intriguing headline: “A Mock Paris: French Plan to Hoodwink German Raiders.” The ruse, explained the paper, had only just come to light, and it was almost too fantastical to be true. “Camouflaged streets, factories, dwelling houses, railways, with stations and trains complete, and in fact a camouflaged capital, was the gigantic task on which French engineers were engaged when the Armistice put an end to military operations,” ran the report. It was the brainchild of an electrical engineer called Jacopozzi; a way to draw German aircraft away from the capital and onto a fake conurbation where bombs could fall without causing death and destruction. But the Germans sued for peace as the city began to take shape and Jacopozzi’s ingenuity was never put to the test. Paris was first bombed by German aircraft on 30 August 1914, the first time that a capital city had been attacked in such a manner. Four small bombs were dropped from the hands of Ferdinand von Hiddessen and his observer from their Rumpler Taube monoplane. The casualties were minimal, but the wider psychological damage was profound. A little over a decade after the Wright brothers had made the first brief flight in an airplane, the Americans’ invention was a new and terrifying weapon of war. The home front was now a battlefront, and women and children were no longer safe from enemy fire. Death from above There were other sporadic attacks in the 18 months that followed, including the first attack by Zeppelins (named after their inventor, Count Ferdinand von Zeppelin) in March 1915. The airships came from their bases in Belgium, but none caused serious casualties. However, on 29 January 1916, two Zeppelins appeared in the grey winter sky over the French capital. Their bombs wreaked havoc, killing 24 and wounding 30. The funerals of the dead were held on 7 February 1916 in a service that brought Paris to a…

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Spy, hero, rebel, traitor: the story of Roger Casement
type: item
date: 2026-03-27T08:00:24.000Z
creator: Elinor Evans
subject: First World War
subject: Membership
subject: Period
description: Rory Carroll explores the story and legacy of Roger Casement, an Irish diplomat and celebrated knight of the British empire, whose bold commitment to the cause of Ireland's Home Rule saw him both celebrated as a hero and condemned as a traitor
encoded: Rory Carroll unpacks the dramatic final years of Roger Casement – an Irish diplomat and nationalist whose tangled legacy includes heroism, betrayal, and personal scandal. Carroll tells Elinor Evans about how Casement's support of Irish Home Rule in the early 20th century morphed into a bold plan. As the First World War raged on, and Britain's attentions were engaged elsewhere, Casement chose a fateful path: to ally with Germany, seeking arms and support for the nationalist cause. Find out more about the cause of Home Rule, Irish Nationalism, and the 1916 Easter Rising. Go beyond the podcast.

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How the work of American folk song collectors inspired The History of Sound
type: item
date: 2026-02-04T17:20:02.000Z
creator: Jonathan Wright
subject: 20th Century
subject: First World War
subject: Period
subject: Trends-Entertainment
subject: TV interest
description: In the early 20th century, armed with new-fangled recording devices, folklorists and ethnomusicologists set out on song-collecting expeditions across the US. Their work documented music that might otherwise have been lost or changed as it was passed on between generations. Jonathan Wright looks at their work and speaks with Oliver Hermanus, director of The History of Sound, about the inspirations from real history that informed the film
encoded: Period romance The History of Sound focuses on the relationship between two musicians, Lionel (Paul Mescal) and David (Josh O’Connor). The duo begin an affair at the New England Conservatory of Music in 1917, but their lives diverge with the US’s entry into the First World War. David is drafted to fight on the Western Front. Lionel, whose poor eyesight precludes military service, returns to his family’s modest farm in Kentucky. Post-conflict, the men meet again for a trip across Maine, visiting rural homes to record folk songs on wax phonograph cylinders – sometimes called Edison cylinders after inventor Thomas Edison (1847–1931). But in a film of lost love, there’s no conventional happy ending here. The drama also deals with class, repression, missed opportunities, grief and the way we all time-travel across our own personal histories so that, to quote director Oliver Hermanus, we sometimes find ourselves “having conversations from the past in our heads”. Underpinning the emotional truth of the drama is the filmmakers’ research into the early 20th century – and, more specifically, into the work of those hardy souls who set out to document the traditional music they heard in shacks, on porches and around campfires. View oEmbed on the source website Is The History of Sound a true story? And were Lionel and David real? No, the History of Sound is not a true story – it’s based on Ben Shattuck’s 2018 short story of the same name – however, Paul Mescal’s Lionel and Josh O’Connor’s David are historically plausible figures, despite both being fictional. From the 19th century onwards, men and women on both sides of the Atlantic were fascinated by the folk tradition and set out to catalogue songs, first by collating lyrics and annotating tunes, and later via making recordings. Who were these real-life collectors? In the UK, the major name in the field was Cecil Sharp (1859–1924). Among his many achievements, Morris dancing enthusiast Sharp co-founded the English Folk Dance S…

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The First World War’s deadliest battle was stalling, but everything changed when Little Willie arrived
type: item
date: 2026-01-29T12:18:38.000Z
creator: James Osborne
subject: First World War
subject: Period
subject: Discover / Apple News
description: As trench warfare paralysed the Western Front, an experimental vehicle pointed the way toward a different type of warfare – and a century of armoured combat
encoded: By late 1915, the First World War had entered an entirely new phase of combat. What had been expected to be a short, decisive conflict had hardened into a grinding stalemate. On the Western Front, opposing armies were locked into trench systems stretching from the Channel coast to the Swiss border. What little advances were made were measured in yards; the loss of life to claim those yards was measured in the tens of thousands. The First World War had become one of endless attrition, dominated by artillery barrages and machine-gun fire. Both sides understood that while their troops could reach enemy trenches, they couldn’t cross the killing ground in between without being cut down. Traditional solutions were no longer working. Cavalry couldn’t operate in cratered terrain, and infantry couldn’t survive sustained fire. But a new weapon of war was designed to solve this deadlock: the tank. As historian and journalist Mark Urban explains on the HistoryExtra podcast, the tank began as a practical experiment – an attempt to answer this specific battlefield problem. Why the Western Front needed something new What armies needed was something that could move forward under fire, protect its crew, crush barbed wire and cross trenches. The idea of an armoured vehicle wasn’t new (an armoured warhorse served a not-too-distant function), but only recent technological developments made it feasible. Internal combustion engines, steel armour plates and continuous tracks finally made the machines possible. The first of these was Little Willie. Built by Foster & Co in Lincoln, Little Willie wasn’t intended to see combat. Instead, it was an idea that was designed to answer one crucial question: could a tracked vehicle move across shattered ground and trenches without breaking down? Read more | Life in the trenches during WWI “That is the first tank. It’s a prototype,” Urban says. Little Willie had obvious shortcomings. It struggled to cross wide trenches, had no turret, and had numerous…

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How tanks redefined warfare
type: item
date: 2026-01-21T08:10:15.000Z
creator: Emily Briffett
subject: First World War
subject: Membership
subject: Period
subject: Second World War
description: Mark Urban chronicles the characters and conflicts that contributed to the dramatic evolution of armoured warfare
encoded: From the mud-churned battlefields of the First World War to the high-stakes clashes of the Cold War, the tank has shaped the course of conflict like no other machine. In this episode, Emily Briffett is joined by Mark Urban, as he reveals the dramatic evolution of armoured warfare through its iconic vehicles – and the engineers, commanders and crews who drove them into the history books.

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The First World War’s Christmas truce is a heartwarming story – but it never happened
type: item
date: 2025-12-24T10:45:32.000Z
creator: James Osborne
subject: First World War
subject: Period
subject: Discover / Apple News
description: In the early stages of the First World War, Brits and Germans came together on the frontlines to pause the fighting for Christmas – at least, that’s how the story goes. But what really happened, and are Christmas truces just a wishful myth?
encoded: The story is genuinely irresistible. On a frozen battlefield in December 1914, the sound of artillery stops, and British and German soldiers fighting in the First World War climb out of the trenches. They meet in the hellscape that is No Man's Land, transforming it into a site of warm Christmas spirit. They exchange gifts, sing carols and play football together. It’s a reassuringly humanising moment that proves ordinary people could still recognise one another as individuals, even if they were still enemies. The problem is that this version of events is largely a myth. As historian Alex Churchill explains on the HistoryExtra podcast, what did happen across European battlefields during the Christmas of 1914 was far more limited and fragmented than popular memory suggests. So, what really happened, and why does the myth persist? No single Christmas truce, and no football match “The Christmas truce is a misnomer,” Churchill says. “It’s Christmas truces: plural.” There was no single, unified ceasefire stretching along the Western Front and crucially, as Churchill emphasises, “fighting didn’t officially stop”. Instead, what occurred in late December 1914 was a series of highly localised, informal pauses in certain sectors, while in others, the war continued uninterrupted. That’s one of the biggest misconceptions. Another is the story of the football match – perhaps the single most enduring part of the Christmas truce story. In retellings, British and German soldiers are said to have organised an impromptu but orderly game in No Man's Land, complete with teams, goals and spectators. It’s subsequently become a symbol of the combatants’ shared culture, values and goodwill. Read more | Life in the trenches during WWI: your essential guide But, as Churchill sets out, this almost certainly never happened. “What people think happened is the equivalent of a Premier League football match with thousands of people watching on a vast open space,” Churchill explains. “But that didn’t…

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Did the WW1 Christmas truce really happen?
type: item
date: 2025-12-24T08:00:17.000Z
creator: Rachel Dinning
subject: First World War
subject: Membership
subject: Period
description: Historian Alex Churchill discusses the famous story of the First World War's Christmas truce – and reveals what really happened in the trenches in December 1914
encoded: It’s one of the most romantic images of the First World War: British and German soldiers meeting in No Man’s Land on Christmas Day, 1914, for a spontaneous truce and a game of football. But did it actually happen? Historian Alex Churchill joins Rachel Dinning to discuss the famous event – and reveals what really happened in the trenches in December 1914. Don’t miss our six-episode HistoryExtra Academy course WW1: Myths and Misconceptions, in which Alex Churchill challenges the most significant misunderstandings about the global conflict. Go beyond the podcast.

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Why were these British Second World War burials draped with Nazi flags?
type: item
date: 2025-09-27T09:20:18.000Z
creator: James Osborne
subject: 20th Century
subject: First World War
subject: Period
subject: Second World War
subject: Discover / Apple News
description: During the Second World War, Britain held funerals for enemy servicemen with swastika flags. This is how respect for the dead could become a weapon of war
encoded: During the Second World War, British civilians who stayed on home soil sometimes witnessed an extraordinary sight: a British-held funeral of a German serviceman, carried through local streets in a coffin draped with a bold red and black swastika flag. It’s an image that seems almost unimaginable in wartime Britain. But such funerals weren’t held by Brits with Nazi sympathies. They were endorsed, visible and calculated public ceremonies that held a very specific purpose. “When somebody dies, even if they’re on the other side, you’re faced with the practical question of having a body, [and] treaties stipulate that even enemy dead should be buried with some respect,” explains historian Tim Grady, author of Burying the Enemy: The Story of Those who Cared for the Dead in Two World Wars, speaking on the HistoryExtra podcast about the treatment of British and German war dead in the wars of the 20th century. But how, exactly, did such visually shocking funerals end up taking place in Britain? The practical problem of the war dead Every conflict leaves behind bodies. In the most basic sense, burying the enemy dead was a matter of hygiene: corpses couldn’t simply be left to decay on public land. But there was also a legal and moral dimension. The Hague Conventions of 1899 and 1907, which both Britain and Germany had signed, required that enemy dead be treated decently and, where possible, buried honourably. The principle was that the humanity of the fallen should be acknowledged, regardless of uniform. “Prisoners of war might be able to take a body to a cemetery, accompany it to the grave and take part in the funeral,” says Grady. “That happened in both Germany and Britain in both the First and Second World Wars.” But that wasn’t the only story. WW2 | The Big Questions Member exclusive | Historian and broadcaster Laurence Rees explains major moments of the global conflict in this five-part series. Listen to all episodes now In the First World War, professional armies often co…

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How a forgotten law helped women’s football conquer the world – but only by accident
type: item
date: 2025-07-26T15:56:50.000Z
creator: James Osborne
subject: 20th Century
subject: First World War
subject: Period
subject: Discover / Apple News
description: A landmark US law passed more than 50 years ago helped build the world’s most successful national women’s football team. Historian Jean Williams explains how Title IX changed the game, and why the rest of the world is still playing catch-up
encoded: For decades, the United States has been a dominant force in women’s football; soccer. With four World Cup titles and multiple Olympic golds, the US women’s national team has become synonymous with international success and sporting achievement. Meanwhile, their male counterparts – while showing some intermittent signs of growth or progress – have rarely posed a serious threat on the global stage. What explains such a stark divide between the two? According to historian Jean Williams, speaking on the HistoryExtra podcast, the answer isn’t about innate talent or superior tactics: it’s about small details within US federal law. “It’s because of a law called Title IX, enacted in 1972,” says Williams. Title IX: the game-changing law Passed in 1972 as part of President Richard Nixon’s civil rights Education Amendments (the that the Watergate scandal would break, toppling the infamous president two years later), Title IX was designed to prohibit sex-based discrimination in any education programme receiving federal funding. Though not originally intended to transform access to sport, its impact on American athletics – particularly women’s sport – was profound. Read more | The 5 most notorious presidents in US history “It was an education law that stated: if federal funds had been used in any educational facility for male students, an exactly comparable amount had to be used for female activities,” Williams explains. Across the country, in the wake of Nixon’s changes, schools and universities were compelled to provide equal funding for opportunities to girls and women. Crucially, that meant not only equal access to teams, but also to facilities, coaching and financial investment. And Williams says it had “unintended consequences” for sport. <img src="https://images.immediate.co.uk/production/volatile/sites/7/2025/07/GettyImages-515119132-37f9c0d-e1753545053820.jpg" width="1500" height="1000" alt="President Richard Nixon delivers a victory speech in Washington DC after winnin…

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Not just the Western Front: why we can't ignore the rest of the world
type: item
date: 2025-07-21T09:43:37.000Z
subject: First World War
subject: Membership
subject: Period
subject: HistoryExtra Academy
subject: HistoryExtra Academy WW1 Myths and Misconceptions course
description: While the Western Front dominates most accounts of World War One, the fighting spanned continents. In episode four of her HistoryExtra Academy series 'World War One: Myths and Misconceptions', historian Alex Churchill spotlights the truly global nature of the conflict
encoded: View Green Video on the source website More episodes Alex Churchill is a historian and presenter who specialises in 20th-century history. Her latest book, co-authored with Nicolai Eberholst, is Ring of Fire: A New Global History of the Outbreak of the First World War (Bloomsbury, 2025)

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